Removing 12a from FB - First Time
 

First time removing the 12a.

I'm leaving the transmission in and just removing the engine.

Is it necessary to remove the radiator? Or will I have enough space in front of the engine if I remove the fan, the fan flange, and the radiator shroud.

I'm renting an engine hoist and just want to keep the time to a minimum I'll need it to remove the engine.

Thanks for your help.

Since you need to remove the radiator hoses anyway, it will be much easier just to remove the radiator all together.

I've removed/install doing it engine only and engine/trans together. My preference is to do it by removing the engine/trans together. I can do it by myself in about two hours. The trick is to get the car high on jack stands to give the trans a good angle.

Tranny can stayso does the radiator but to ensure rad doesnt sustain any damages, remove it.


Hood can stay but you must remove one of the front wheels (and jackstand) so the cherry picker can slide from the side

I ruined part of my radiator by leaving it in, I recommend taking it out first.

Its always been my experience that removing the rad makes it much easier to pull the engine, and prevents the rad from being damaged.

I'm also voting for removing radiator and transmission with the engine.

Good idea to remove the radiator for clearance , and get it rodded out at a radiator shop.

I did the engine removal and install well with in 4 hours in an apartment parking lot. Getting everything right, waiting for another water pump housing, and getting everything right took from halloween to thanksgiving. Also rain added to the time.

Also have self etching primer and paint handy to treat rusty otherwise unreachable metal. And take lots of pictures of the carburetor cables. and the vacuum lines.

How can you F U a water pump housing you ask? The whole engine replacement on a 30 year old sportscar thing would make a great reality tv show.

Great feeling of accomplishment after you get everything right!!

Originally I was just looking at pulling the engine. The intake manifold gasket was oil soaked. Replaced and went from clouds of white smoke to clouds of gray smoke.

Yes pulling the radiator at this point is only 4 more bolts & off to a radiator shop. I may never do this again so I'm assessing each part that comes off and to keep or replace.

The front end is already up in the air and the front wheels off. Much easier to move around underneath. Limited garage space already dictated the cherry-picker from the side

Pulling the engine with the trans would make the realignment of the two easier, but I'm not sure about my working space. (Cluttered family garage.)

Over 80 photos so far, before, during and after removal of each part. Hoses and vacuum lines labeled for the photos. Lots of baggies of different sizes with labels. I know I'm going to forget something by the time it all goes back together.

Great suggestion on the primer and paint. Thanks.

(I did replace the clutch on my departed 74 Rx3, using only hand tools, the car's scissor jack, and two jack-stands, on a gravel driveway. Only out of necessity.)

Thanks for all the responses.

Ya, I labelled all those vacuum hoses with white tape. Too bad the labels got covered with 30 years of grim from my grimy hands. The cables to the carb is really what really threw me off.

And I lost the timing mark. What happened was Atkins said I needed to paint a mark on the leading and trailing notches on the pulley, so I removed the pulley. It is obvious which are trailing and leading when you are using a timing light. Autolite sparkplugs are great for finding the timing mark by trial and error. Switch to NKG when you get things sorted out.

I also replaced the master brake, and clutch hydraulics while I had things apart.

Never had to remove a wheel.


I can advise getting about 8 links of 5/16 chain. Its the perfect length for adjusting the engine too and fro on the cherry picker hook.


I usually remove the water pump and everything except the bare block before removal.

coz my engine hoist is not a low profile and wide enough to slide all the way unless i set the jack sbtands at the highest point. A good thing about it is that i dont have to deal with the hood (removal, install and lining up the hood).

And why remove the water pump during engine removal? I dont see the point of this process

Just pulled the radiator. Tons more room to work.

When my dad owned the car he had an Atkins rebuilt put in. The shop labeled all the hoses with tape, but those fell off.

This is the 3rd time I've had the carb off. I labeled each cable and photo them for reference. Only one has two nuts, one has to be loosened which allows the other to turn & loose the setting. I Sharpie painted the threads on the outside thread in case the original position was lost.

Ah, I see. My car is on stock springs. ;)

I take the alternator waterpump the whole mess out and reflect it to the side. Can't honestly say why I do (its been a while), but there was a reason. :scratch:

I'm pulling as much as I can off the engine prior to removal because I want to see where and how everything fits together, but more importantly I want to extract the smallest possible unit.

On re-installation I may put more components back on first. Its a grand learning process.

One thing I found helpful is to remove the intake/carb/rats nets/passenger side wiring as one until. This allowed me to take lots of pictures. I also collect a lot of reference pics and consult the service manual. it's really not hard to remember where the stuff goes after doing to "several" times.

http://i1133.photobucket.com/albums/...ild2medium.jpg

+1

[QUOTE=KansasCityREPU;11674376]One thing I found helpful is to remove the intake/carb/rats nets/passenger side wiring as one until. This allowed me to take lots of pictures. I also collect a lot of reference pics and consult the service manual. it's really not hard to remember where the stuff goes after doing to "several" times.

/QUOTE]

May I ask where you got your engine stand?

(and that is a work of art)

The two times I pulled the engine out of my '79 race jalopy, I took the hood off and left the transmission in the car. It was fairly easy to use the engine crane to slide the engine back onto the transmission input shaft. The first time, I didn't pull the rad and crushed a few fins. The second time, it came out.

Took me about a weekend to pull the old motor, clean the new one, disassemble and clean the carb, then put it all back together again. Lots of fun. :D

I miss that old junker.

+1 on leaving the transmission in. I've never pulled or installed an engine with the trans attached, always goes pretty easily. With my project I installed the transmission first and engine separate.

I pulled an engine and trans together once. Never again. It was stupid. You have to take off the hood and I needed the help of someone else to push down on the tranny to keep it from scratching all the way under the tunnel as I was pulling the engine crane. Dumb. Every other time I leave the tranny in and leave the hood on. The engine pulls go very fast and it only requires one person, not two.

However in my defense the pilot bearing had died and stuck to the trans input shaft. Of course if I had left the tranny in, I'd have had all that much extra leverage, so for my loss I suppose. Yeah, it was far more difficult to separate them with both outside the bay. Never again. I don't get people like kentestu who always pull both together every time. Then again he says he hates working on cars. Who could hate working on a 7? At least an FB/SA? I get that the FDs suck to work on, but a 1st gen?

[QUOTE=TimWilbers;11674692]The stand is a cheap Harbor Fright one and the head is from Pineapple Racing.

[QUOTE=KansasCityREPU;11675027]Great.
We have a Harbor Freight store not far from home.
Thanks.

I had a new clutch and pilot bearing installed about 3 years back.
And I was planning on taking out just the engine. I'm a one-person shop.

I don't know your build type, but...

When I mate the engine to the transmission; I just pick it up by hand and weezel it in. Then agin I don't have anything attached to it.... That might be why I remove the water pump and alternator?